Iraqi premier orders "immediate" withdrawal of fake bomb detectors

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi (C)

Photograph: EPA/IRAQI PRIME MINISTER OFFICE/HAND

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi orders the immediate withdrawal from security checkpoints of fake bomb detectors sold by a British company, after the killing of more than 100 people in a Baghdad car bomb attack claimed by Islamic State.

Al-Abadi orders the Interior Ministry to erect screening gates to check vehicles for explosives at the entrances to the capital.

The BBC reported in 2013 that a British businessman was jailed for 10 years in Britain for selling the fake bomb detectors, which it said were "modelled on a novelty golf ball finder", to Iraq and other countries. Iraqi authorities previously ordered their withdrawal but they remained in use in an apparent bid to provide a false sense of security.

Al-Abadi also orders intensified use of aerial surveillance and intelligence to discover militants' hideouts.

Beirut (dpa) - Syrian government forces and their allies advanced deeper into the shrinking rebel-held enclave in eastern Aleppo on Wednesday, seizing the Old City, while demanding the armed opposition groups leave the area.